


woven in my soul

by Lise



Series: Remember This Cold [17]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bonding Under Duress (Sort Of), Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Loki takes care of his own, M/M, Protectiveness, Rescue, Steve Rogers: Damsel In Distress, Thor and Loki talk for the first time in like 75K, a lot of dead mooks, borrowing comics villains shamelessly, no sex alas, now you made Loki mad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-21
Updated: 2013-11-21
Packaged: 2018-01-02 05:46:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1053206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lise/pseuds/Lise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Steve has been captured,” Thor said, after a moment’s pause, “and we…we require your help.”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	woven in my soul

**Author's Note:**

> Oh man, I am so, so happy to (a) finally be able to post something, and (b) finally be able to post this. I've been working on this for what feels like an ass-long time, and I'm just... very pleased to be able to put it up now, because I'm pretty pleased with it. 
> 
> Also, I just gotta say: figures it would take putting Steve in bodily peril to get Loki and Thor to actually talk again. Which, if you hadn't noticed, is kind of a seminal moment in this verse, given that they've been living in the same space and have not spoken once. :D 
> 
> Anyway, this series! Just keeps expanding! and now has a couple short bonus installments on my tumblr that I'm not planning to crosspost here. And will have at least one more full length part that I have planned. (At least.) 
> 
> I'm still so thrilled that people actually like this series, and this pairing ~~and me.~~
> 
> With thanks, of course, to my glorious beta, [zaataronpita](http://zaataronpita.tumblr.com), who keeps me squarely in line. Sort of.
> 
> (I promise I'm working on my other projects; thank you for your patience with me!)

He was engrossed in the third part of a Midgardian saga – though it was not, curiously enough, set on Midgard or any recognizable realm – when there was a knock on the door. Expecting Steve, Loki walked over without truly removing his attention from Samwise Gamgee’s exploits, and opened the door before he looked up from the page.

It wasn’t Steve standing on the threshold. It was Thor.

Thor, who besides a few tentative overtures in the very early days that Loki had studiously ignored, had left him alone. Who had, for once, taken Loki’s lack of interest in communication and respected it, rather than ignoring it. And now he was here. Loki’s first reaction was to bare his teeth and slam the door, but the look on Thor’s face brought him up short. He looked tense. Worried.

He knew before he asked, but he asked anyway, because he wanted to be wrong. “What is it,” he snapped.

“Steve has been captured,” Thor said, after a moment’s pause, “and we…we require your help.”

Loki felt his heart stutter to a halt. He froze, for a moment, feeling himself unable to move. _He could be dead already,_ a voice whispered across the back of his thoughts. _His body lying cooling, bent and broken somewhere while you did nothing._ He forced the well of metallic tasting panic down and focused on the cold, sharp, clear feeling of anger instead.

_He is mine._ The thought was possessive and sharp and not altogether accurate, but he wrapped himself in it because it was better than fear. _I will rip the hearts out of every one of them who thought they could touch him._

He summoned his leathers in one smooth gesture, casual garb melting away, and stepped forward. “Well then,” he said, keeping his tone short and clipped. He would not let Thor see in this any acceptance of _him._ “I will require that you tell me everything.”

Thor’s shoulders slumped in obvious relief. He held the door open. “Of course,” he said, his expression nakedly grateful. Had he expected him to refuse? “I only know…SHIELD has told us little, and we…my friends…suspect they have more information than they have given.”

“That’s a surprise,” Loki drawled. “What _do_ you know, then?” His skin was prickling with urgency he was struggling not to show. Every bone in his body yearned to simply go his own way, but he didn’t know enough, and even if it took time – _precious_ time – information could only help.

He _would_ do this right.

“It is – some old enemy of his.” Thor kept sneaking sideways glances at Loki. Perhaps he thought he was being subtle. “They call themselves HYDRA.” Loki felt his mouth twist, and Thor straightened. “You know the name?”

“I…borrowed…from their ranks during my attack.” He felt, for a moment, inexplicably angry with himself for doing so, as though he might have known. Or as though he would have cared. “It matters not. Go on.”

“SHIELD does not wish us to strike.” Thor hesitated, and then added, with a touch of anger, “they have suggested that if we do not obey that action will be taken against us. Of course, I doubt that they could harm me much, but the others…”

Loki’s stomach churned and he just managed not to snarl. His magic welled up, seething just under his skin in response to his emotion, and Loki didn’t bother to try to calm himself, this time. “Why would they hold you back?”

“The lady Romanoff- the Black Widow,” Thor corrected himself, and Loki wondered absently how many times the spider had had to correct him. “She found that there is…an object. A weapon, that SHIELD desires.”

Loki nodded, shortly. “So they are playing for time while they try to puzzle out a way to get both. I see.” And playing with Steve’s well-being, and potentially his life. Loki’s hands curled into fists. “I’m certain I could persuade them to see reason.” He heard his voice vibrate, just slightly, and Thor’s hand was suddenly heavy on his shoulder.

“No,” he said, at once, voice harsh. “Loki, that is not-”

“Get your hand off me.” Thor jerked his hand away, and Loki didn’t so much as glance at him. “Let me make this perfectly clear. Nothing has changed between us. I am not here for _you._ ”

He caught a spasm of Thor’s face out of the corner of his eye. “I know that.”

“Then pray remember it.” Loki half turned, eyebrows raised. “Are you leading me someplace in particular to discuss what it is you _do_ intend, or…?”

“This way,” Thor said, after a moment. His voice was heavy and unhappy, but Loki kept his expression neutral. Anger seethed under his skin, and Loki let it. One way or another, it would find a target.

They turned down another hallway and toward a closed door through which Loki could hear raised voices. Familiar enough, though the contact he’d had with the lot of them had been…minimal. To his relief. Thor opened the door without pause, though, clearing his throat, and past his bulky frame Loki could just see the rest of them clumped around a table.

“Thor! Good, was wondering where you went. We need to talk strategy, because no _way_ are we staying here while HYDRA does something undoubtedly awful to- oh. Oh no. You can’t be _serious._ ”

Ah, Loki thought, as Stark turned midway through the sentence. Stark’s eyes fixed on him and his expression flashed from tense worry to incredulity to anger. So Thor hadn’t mentioned his intentions. Wonderful.

“He has every right,” Thor said, stepping into the room. Loki leaned against the doorway, keeping his expression neutral.

“Who has every right,” his hawkling began, turning around, and immediately stiffened, hand going for a knife. “What the – _you let him out?_ ” Loki gave him a patronizing smile that didn’t reach his eyes, and Barton’s lips peeled back from his teeth. “Get the fuck out of here right now or there’s going to be a knife in your little brother’s _throat-_ ”

“Loki can help us!” Thor said, loudly, and Loki didn’t miss that the defensive step he took both blocked Barton’s aim and also their eye contact. “He has skills none of us have, much practice getting into places unseen-” The man who contained the green monster seemed to be breathing deeply and carefully at the other end of the room, his eyes fixed on Loki. He resisted the likely suicidal urge to smile at him, too.

“And is a _psychotic, potentially-_ ex but who knows _supervillain,_ ” Stark said loudly. “Or are you forgetting that part?”

“Get him out of here or I swear to god I’m going to put a knife through his throat,” Barton said, savagely, and Loki could almost see the dark cloud gathering over his head.

“I understand your grievance, Clint Barton, but I will not accept threats made against my brother,” he said, lowly, and the man-monster – Banner, Loki remembered – said something like, “guys, maybe we should all sit down and take a moment to think-”

“You may either,” Loki said, keeping his voice level and not raising it so much as a notch. As he’d hoped, the surprise silenced Thor’s merry band. “Accept my help and be kept abreast of my intentions, or not. Regardless, I do not intend to stand here _wringing my hands_ while I wait for someone to make a move. Your choice. In truth, I care little.”

He ignored the look Thor was giving him, keeping his eyes on Banner instead. The silence was profound, but only momentary. 

“We’re supposed to trust you,” Stark said. Of course it was Stark to speak first. The man didn’t know when to be silent. Loki didn’t so much as glance in his direction.

“In this? Yes.” Loki kept his voice flat, expressionless. “The Captain is my lover. I do not take trifling with what is mine kindly. If nothing else, you may rely absolutely on my intention to rip the heart out of every living thing that stands in my way.”

“Brother,” Thor said, quietly, and Loki glanced round before he could remember not to, and only then realized that he was shaking, minutely, green threads of magic spooling around his clenched fists and winding up his arms. He felt as though he could crack the world with his bare hands. Part of him thought he wanted to.

The so-called Avengers were staring at him. Barton held a knife in hand, though he seemed otherwise frozen. The Widow’s stance was braced, and Stark’s thumb hovered over a button that would likely summon the suit. He could see a hint of green in Banner’s skin. _Just destroy them,_ the rage in Loki’s blood whispered, soft and sweet and seductive. _They’re in your way. You need to go. You should be gone, every minute is another minute in which they might have killed him._

“Brother,” Thor said again, his voice quiet and steady. “You need to stay calm. You cannot…you cannot help Steve if you are blinded by rage. We will…we will strike back. But just as you always told me, first we need a plan.”

Loki forced the storm down, controlled it. Slowly, carefully. Drew the magic back under his skin. Recklessness could get Steve killed as easily as dawdling might. He needed to think calmly, rationally, and carefully. It wasn’t Steve’s friends he wanted to be fighting.

“I am calm,” he said, when he was certain he could keep his voice steady. Stark made a noise that was probably supposed to be a laugh.

“Really?”

“Stark.” That was Romanova, surprisingly enough. Her eyes on Loki were clear, unmoving, and full of dislike if not outright hatred, but her tone was one of warning. “Don’t push it. He’s offering to help. I say we take it.”

“Tasha,” Barton said quietly, though his face was stony. Loki felt a faint twinge of surprise. Romanova shook her head.

“I know,” she said, her voice nearly expressionless. “But Captain Rogers is missing and undoubtedly in danger. We don’t know how much time we have, or what HYDRA’s plans are, and SHIELD’s trying to play both sides of the field. I know an asset when I see one. I don’t trust him. Steve does. Maybe that’s enough. And if he’s telling the truth…I’d rather know where he is than not.” Her eyes bored into Loki’s. “Not to mention that if he fucks us over, I’ve got some very creative ideas of what to do with him.”

Loki barely felt the finger of cold crawl down his spine. She would. It wasn’t nearly enough to make him waver in his focus, though, and he simply bared his teeth at her in a smile. “It’s a relief one of you has some sense. Are the rest of you going to bicker further, or can we move forward?”

Thor’s hand landed heavily on his shoulder, and Loki moved to twitch it off. “There is no need to be rude,” he chided, and Loki let his lip curl. At the other end of the table, Banner shifted.

“Rude or not, he’s got a point,” the man said, green tint faded from his skin. “We’re wasting time.” Loki could feel his blood humming, strung tight. They could be killing Steve now. Or worse. Loki’s mind supplied painfully vivid possibilities and he fought to shove them away, breathing quickening.

“All right,” Stark said, after a moment, sounding harried and unhappy. “All right, _fine,_ I’d just like to put out there that I’m not – Clint, are you okay with…”

“Okay with this? No,” Barton snapped. Loki deliberately didn’t glance in his direction. “But – but I’ll put up with it. For Steve.”

“How gracious,” Loki murmured, and both the spider and his hawkling gave him a look that promised death. Loki ignored it. “If you are all finished dithering, then?”

“Don’t push it,” Stark said, a little tightly. “What did Thor-”

“Very little.” Loki stepped up to the table, ignoring the slight shifts of the others around it. The wary stares made him itch, slightly, but it mattered little next to the mingled worry and anger humming barely controlled under his skin. There was a map of Midgard on the table, several sites circled. “I take it you are stuck here. How effectively?”

“Fairly effectively,” the Widow said. The slight hint of sourness in her voice was ironed out quickly, replaced with a cool professionalism. “Systems are still all up and running, but the minute we make a move for the doors…there’s teams with gas canisters that can take out everyone but Thor and the Hulk, and Fury dropped a couple hints that there was something nasty he was keeping in reserve.”

Loki felt the corner of his mouth twitch up. One-eyed tyrants. The same in every realm, perhaps. The smile, if it was that, faded quickly. “The Captain. Do you know where he’s being kept?” Silence, and Loki felt his expression tighten, though he hoped it didn’t show. “That would be a no, then. Well. It’s a good thing you _did_ call me.” Half-closing his eyes, it was only a moment’s work to reach for his magic and trigger the locator spell he’d linked to Steve’s flesh early on, so that he would be able to find him at will. He took a moment to orient himself, process the information he was being given, and opened his eyes again. “Here,” he said, indicating one of the circles in the Alps. “I take it there is some sort of – base – in this area?”

Stark was giving him a narrow-eyed look. Barton’s shoulders hunched. “Yes,” Banner said, after a moment. Loki did his best to ignore Thor peering over his shoulder. “Wait, did you just-” he stopped, and shook his head. “You’re saying Steve is there. For sure.”

“So I am.” Loki’s mind was already racing ahead, what he’d need to know, what kind of preparations he would need to make. It would likely be easy to simply cut the lot of them to shreds, but there was the risk that if he did that they might have time to kill the Captain (Steve, his mind tried to correct, but he pushed that away) rather than allow his rescue.

He could not – _would_ not – tolerate that outcome.

“How do you know?” Romanova asked, sharply. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I am sure,” Loki said, his tone vibrating on the edge of a snap.

“A locator spell,” Thor said, eagerly, sounding immeasurably pleased with himself. “Is that what it is?

“Yes,” Loki said. Barton’s eyes narrowed.

“You’ve got Steve tagged with some kind of magic tracking device?” He didn’t sound terribly pleased. Loki turned his head just enough to bare his teeth in a smile in his direction.

“Doesn’t your SHIELD have you ‘tagged’ with one as well?” He turned back to the map, however, resolutely. “Do you know anything about this location?”

“Just that it’s been tagged as a likely site for HYDRA activity before,” Romanova said, leaning forward over the table. “Recon hasn’t found anything on flyovers, so probably underground – this…spell of yours, does it tell you anything about what kind of condition Steve’s in?”

“No,” Loki said, not quite curtly. The working would function just as well in dead flesh as in living. Anything short of total dismemberment would-

Loki took a slow breath in through his nose. They wouldn’t have killed him already. Too valuable. Probably. (If he dies- Loki severed that thought at the root.) “No,” he repeated, “not necessarily.” Thor’s hand had made it back to his shoulder, heavy and pressing down as though he might fly away. Loki forced himself to focus. “Are they likely to have anything capable of detecting magic?”

“No. I don’t know. Maybe?” Stark shook his head. “Clint?”

“I don’t know. It’s never been an issue for me. But even before that – problem,” Barton said. His eyes fixed on Loki were still full of hate, but at least he seemed willing to let it slide for the moment. “SHIELD has all kinds of sensors, cameras, what have you, fixed on this building at all times in case you get out. Stuff tuned to your electromagnetic whatever-the-fuck, too, so including teleporting. And if they’re monitoring us to make sure we stay put now, too, which they are, that goes double.”

Loki made a dismissive sort of “pfft” noise, eyes fixed on that little circle, running through ideas and eventualities and potential plans one after the other. “Child’s play,” he said, without glancing up. “I figured out how to circumvent every one of your pitiful security measures within the first four days of my…stay.” Silence, and Loki glanced up. Stark looked severely displeased.

“SHIELD’s best and brightest spent four months developing that equipment,” Romanova said, mildly. Loki shrugged.

“I was bored,” he said, simply, and returned to study. “I hope none of you were under the impression that I would be here if I didn’t wish to be.”

“Not anymore,” said Banner, after a moment. He sounded a little like he wanted to smile, but that couldn’t be right. Loki caught just a glimpse of Thor out of the corner of his eye, and found him radiating pride that it took Loki a moment to puzzle out.

When he realized that it might be for _him,_ it was like a hand in his chest squeezing his heart, hard.

He stepped back from the table in a swift, sharp movement. “That all seems clear enough. If you have no further information, I believe I can manage the rest-”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Stark said, holding up both hands. “I’m hoping that sentence won’t end with ‘on your own’ because, um, no.”

Loki gave him a flat stare. “I’m not going to argue with you and this isn’t a negotiation. You would only get in my way.”

“My friends,” Thor broke in, but Barton cut him off, mouth twisting in a sneer.

“You’re delusional if you think we’re going to let you go running off on a solo rescue mission for Captain fucking America, even if you’re banging him. Get us out of here with your magic whatever and we’ll take care of the rest.”

Loki felt himself tense. “And how do you intend to do that without getting the Captain killed with your reckless heroics? I don’t think so.”

“We’re not complete rookies, you know,” Stark said, sounding peevish. “It’s not like we don’t know what we’re doing.”

“From where I’m standing that is exactly what it looks like,” Loki said tightly. Thor shifted.

“Perhaps we should listen to-”

“And if we make the call that grounded supervillains stay grounded?”

Loki felt his lips peel back from his teeth. They were wasting _time_ but he would not back down and allow- “I can think of several ways to solve that problem,” he said, not bothering to mask the threat in his voice. He could feel his magic sparking around his fingers, ready to start a fire. Or an explosion.

“ _Both of you,_ ” Romanova said. “Cut it out and _focus._ Stark – he’s got a point.”

Loki’s head snapped around and he stared at her, utterly taken aback. By the spluttering noises from Stark, he was as well. Romanova held up a hand and ticked off her points. “First – we know he’s got a way to stay under the radar that none of us have. The minute we’re visible, we’ve got both HYDRA and SHIELD on our backs. Second, for an extraction like this, smaller party is better, or odds are that HYDRA will just kill Steve. Third-” Romanova gave him an appraising look, and Loki suspected that she amended what she had been going to say. “Third – once he gets to Steve, it’s easier for him to get back here than it would be for any of us. That clear enough?”

Banner cleared his throat, in the sudden silence that followed. “Yeah,” he said. “I’d say it’s fairly clear. And I’m convinced. This isn’t my skill set. And honestly – in terms of lifespan alone, who do you think has the most experience getting in where they’re not supposed to be?”

Loki had expected that even less than he’d expected Romanova’s support. He couldn’t keep himself from staring, though he glanced aside quickly when Banner looked toward him. Romanova, Banner, Thor, if the other two would just…

“Fine,” Stark said. He didn’t sound happy about it, and Barton’s expression was mutinous, but he nodded jerkily. “Fine, just – _fuck._ I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this. We send Undesireable Number One to get Captain America, and – _if you fuck this up_ -”

“I will not,” Loki said coldly, “’Fuck this up.’” He pushed away the flicker of _you failed everything else that mattered to you. Why not this?_ He couldn’t afford doubts right now. Thor’s presence at his back, hatefully, felt reassuring. “I don’t believe I’ll be long.”

“Wait,” Thor said, suddenly.  Loki fought the urge to wince. “Before…may I speak with you, a moment?”

Loki’s first instinct was to snap _no,_ as was his second, but the third was hesitation. After a moment’s pause, he allowed a begrudging, “I suppose. Briefly.” He glanced around the room, particularly at Stark’s deliberately disinterested expression, and added, “not here.”

Thor’s expression of relief was so nakedly obvious that it was embarrassing to look at, and Loki simply turned and walked out of the room, trusting that Thor would follow. Indeed, it was only a couple strides before Thor fell into step with him. Their strides still matched easily, without Loki’s thought, and that only irritated him more as he tried to think through anything he might need.

“Loki,” Thor said, and then stopped. Loki was inclined to think he revised what he was going to say, changing it to a, “you will be careful?”

“When am I not,” Loki said crisply. He could almost hear Thor frown, wanting to object.

“I know that you are…concerned,” he said, instead of arguing. “And I wished to say that I am…confident that you will succeed.”

“If I needed your confidence, that would be a relief.”

Loki was somewhat gratified by the wince he caught out of the corner of his eye, but it was less satisfying than he expected it to be. Thor was silent for a moment, probably trying to think of a new tactic.

“Do you have one of the – cell phones, the communication devices Midgardians use?” Thor asked, abruptly. Loki gave him a sidelong look.

“Yes,” he said, after a moment, cautiously. Thor nodded, his expression one of focused determination.

“I believe that you do not need help,” Thor said, and then rushed on before Loki could thank him for that with abundant sarcasm. “But…if you should…I would like to give you the number for the device I was given. So you can summon me if need be.”

Loki gave him a hard look. Several answers occurred to him in varying degrees of hurtful, but ultimately he brushed most of them aside. “If I had the time to call you,” he said, “then I would likely have the time to solve the situation myself.”

Thor did not seem terribly stung. “Just in case,” he said, insistently.

It would be easy to turn him down and just go. Very, very easy.

Loki wasn’t entirely certain why he didn’t. He sighed, summoned his mobile, and turned it on with a flick of his fingers. “Very well,” he said, making his voice suitably annoyed, at the very least. “For Steve’s benefit.”

He tapped the number into his phone, saved it under the contact name of “Oaf”, and firmly ignored the way Thor watched him, refusing to quantify the expression in those painfully blue eyes.

* * *

Loki had never been very fond of or impressed by the various organs of supervillainy on Midgard. It all seemed like a miserably contrived mess with no real imagination.

The use of an underground lair was not really convincing him otherwise.

It had taken a bit of careful looking to puzzle out where in the general area HYDRA was lurking, even with the benefit of the humming beacon at the back of his mind signaling Steve’s whereabouts. He took the slow way in, shielded from sight, after some consideration, unwilling to take the risk of teleporting directly to his location without more knowledge of where he was being kept, and under what conditions.

Loki kept his thoughts carefully level, emotionless, ignoring the churning in his stomach.

The corridors of the facility were a veritable maze, Loki rapidly discovered. He needed to find somewhere central. Somewhere this size must have some kind of monitoring system, a means of keeping track of its inhabitants…

“…busy with Captain America,” he heard, around a corner, and Loki’s head snapped around. He wheeled, hastening back the way he’d come and down a different corridor, where two men in HYDRA uniform were walking side by side. Loki quickened his pace to follow them.

“Obsessed,” the other one was saying, and Loki suspected he’d missed part of the conversation. “What does she think is going to happen? Do you think she actually believes…”

“Are you saying you don’t?” said the other. Loki evened his speed a few paces behind them, close enough to hear. “She seems pretty sure. I don’t want to be the one to doubt her.”

“As far as I’m concerned we should just kill him already,” the second man grumbled, and Loki closed his eyes for just a moment, the relief washing through him almost strong enough to make him feel dizzy. Not dead, then. He wasn’t going to be too late. At least not yet.

The first one laughed, harshly. “You want to tell her that, when she’s having so much fun?” He said, and between one breath and the next, anger replaced relief. “Whatever she’s doing to make Captain fucking America scream, I-”

His temper, simmering just under his skin, burst into flames. The hallway was empty. Loki wasn’t sure he would have been able to stop himself if it hadn’t been.

His hand coated in magic punched through the man’s body with a viscerally satisfying crunch. Loki wrapped his fingers around the heart and pulled it out through the gaping hole in his back. He didn’t let the shield keeping him invisible drop, simply reached out as the dead man’s companion took a breath, mouth gaping, and slammed magic into him like a hammer, commanding _obey_. “Tell me,” he said, quiet enough that only one pair of ears could catch his voice. “Where can I find your prisoner?”

He would not say _Steve._ Would not _picture_ Steve, suffering, screaming-

The agent gaped at empty air. “Second basement,” he said, sounding dazed. “Third…third room on the right.”

“My thanks,” Loki murmured, and slashed one of his knives across his throat.

His blood was pounding in his temples as he let the body fall, turning around. _You cut the amount of time you had in half, if not more,_ a quiet, rational voice murmured, even as he cast a swift glamour over the corpses. _Fool-_

Then he would just have to move quickly, Loki thought grimly, and reached out, plucking the threads to take himself a level lower in the structure.

He was standing in a large, open space humming with activity, and Loki paused. There were four hallways, one from each side. The space was full of people. He needed to be smart about this. Brute force, as he’d told the Avengers, wasn’t going to be good enough, and was more likely to get Steve killed.

Loki drew himself up, pushed back his shoulders, lifted his chin. He summoned arrogant surety like a cape and let it settle around his shoulders, layered with disdain. Last, he called in his helmet and cape, and dropped the illusion.

In two seconds he had three guns trained on him.

“Oh, spare me,” Loki said, letting his lips twitch ever so minutely. “Don’t tell me you don’t know who I am. I would like to speak with whoever is in charge.” It was perfect showmanship. Ideal, really. It was a risk – Doom might have mentioned his betrayal, perhaps – but Loki doubted it. Not to these. Doom tended to move in…slightly more elevated circles.

“How do we know that you are who you say you are,” a slightly bolder gunman said, after a moment of silence. Loki scoffed.

“Consider how I appeared in your supposedly secret lair without being detected by machine or man. Consider also who would be mad enough to claim to be me who is not.” He smiled, thinly. “Your leader.” One or two of them shifted uneasily. Loki could almost feel his time slipping away, every moment…he let his expression slip a little toward disdainful irritation. “I am waiting.”

“What do you want?” asked a harsh voice behind him, and Loki turned in a smooth movement to find a compact, muscular man, face covered by a hood painted with a skull and a pair of long bones splashed across his chest.  Loki didn’t recognize him, but that was hardly surprising. He’d spent as little time as possible dithering with this sort. Loki smiled in a way that he knew would be recognized as more of a baring of teeth.

“I’ve heard that you have…acquired…a certain figure upon whom I believed I had placed a prior claim.” Loki shrugged one shoulder. “I am willing to waive said claim, but I should like to speak with whoever I am ceding it to.”

“Uh huh.” The man sounded dubious. “And if our leader doesn’t feel like having a chat?”

Loki let his smile stretch, muscles tensing, though he hoped the motion didn’t show. “I would be terribly displeased.”

The man scrutinized him for a while, then made a curt gesture. “This way,” he said. “I’ll ask if she’s willing to spare a few minutes.” He didn’t seem terribly impressed, and that rankled. Loki suppressed that reaction, and rather than following as he moved down one of the hallways, fell into step with him. He ignored the small entourage that followed, intended no doubt as protection. Small enough that he did not foresee difficulties, however.

As long as he could get close enough to Steve to teleport them both free, it wouldn’t matter.

The man with the skull grunted, after a few paces. “Haven’t heard much about you in a while.”

“Then I am doing my job well,” Loki said, evenly. Let him make of that what he would. He kept half an eye on the wall, counting one door, a second several paces later.

“Wait here,” the man said tersely, and Loki checked his stride, eyes on the third door. “If she’s not interested, though…” _As if you could make me leave,_ Loki thought sourly. _As though you could be a threat to me._ The man walked swiftly to the door. Loki braced himself as he opened it, schooled his face to perfect neutrality.

He still was not ready for the sound of screaming that came through the open doorway. Was so far from prepared for what that noise, and the recognition of Steve’s voice in it, did to him. Like a dagger of ice thrust into his entrails and twisted, every nerve on fire, and then the door closed and cut off sound. Every fiber of his being vibrated with the desire to break the door, tear it down, tear this whole place down-

He held still, breathing shallowly.

The man with the skull emerged a moment later, and jerked his head. The screaming had stopped, and Loki’s stomach knotted painfully. “All right,” he said. “Come on.”

Loki kept his stride even with a deliberate effort, giving the man a thin smile as he stepped through the door, entourage still trailing at his heels. He made his eyes trail over the rest of the room, assorted machines whose purpose he couldn’t divine, before letting them move to the center, the metal table and the man bound to it.

Steve had been stripped naked. His chest was rising and falling rapidly, wires trailing from his arms and torso and head, feeding back into the machines. His skin looked slightly grey-pale, marred with bruises and what looked like burns. There was blood running from his nose, his eyes closed. _Still breathing,_ Loki reminded himself. _Stay calm._

The woman standing behind him was smaller than he’d expected. Red-haired, freckled, she looked startlingly young. Her eyes were on Steve, examining him with a kind of mad hunger that made Loki’s skin crawl and also made him want to rip out her throat.

He cleared his throat, taking a step forward, and she held up a hand. The guns at his back came up. Loki stopped.

“Sorry,” she said, almost sounding apologetic. “I’m trying to do something fairly delicate here. If you don’t mind staying there. Loki of Asgard, is it?”

“Loki will do,” he said. “And you are…”

“Sin,” she said. Loki swallowed the urge to scoff. Midgardians and their names. She looked up from Steve, though, and if her eyes still had that strange glint in them they were also sharp, intelligent. “Crossbones tells me that you have an…interest in my good friend Captain America.”

Crossbones? The man with the skull, he supposed. “Somewhat,” he said, and shrugged one shoulder. “In a loose sense. I have found him exasperating in the past.”

“You’re not the only one.” She brushed red hair out of her face, and Loki noticed that her hands were stained with what looked like blood. He looked sharply back to Steve, but couldn’t see any open wounds. “He killed my father, you know.”

Loki raised his eyebrows, trying to calculate. He could close the distance quickly, but the guns were still armed, and if they fired and missed him…and the girl, Sin, was too close. He needed to get her away from Steve. “I had no idea,” he drawled. Whose daughter? he wondered vaguely. She might be anyone’s.

Sin’s eyes flicked back to Steve. “Were you just going to kill him?”

Loki made himself smile. “Use your imagination,” he said, silkily. “I have a great deal more options than something so…banal.” Perhaps he could convince her that he would take better vengeance than she ever could. Perhaps…even if he only seduced her that way enough to draw her away…

“Are you asking for a trade?” Sin asked, sounding interested. Loki settled back on his heels, adopting casual posture.

“Merely expressing…interest. I would be happy to leave him in your capable hands, so long as I am certain he won’t be troubling me again.” He hoped, desperately, that Steve wasn’t listening. Or that he knew what game Loki was playing. Even if he didn’t, though – he couldn’t let that matter. Not now. “What exactly were your intentions?”

Sin glanced at Steve again, and then walked around the table and leaned against it, her fingers brushing up and down Steve’s limp arm. (He would tear those fingers off first.) “I had a few ideas. But I don’t know…I’m intrigued. Might be useful to have a favor from you.”

Loki held in a sigh of relief. _Yes._ He had this, now. It was just a matter of bargaining, and that, he knew how to do. “Did I offer a favor?”

Sin’s smile was full of teeth. Loki would have been impressed, maybe, in other circumstances. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Loki made a casual gesture. “Oh, very well. Say I were motivated to make you an offer. What would be acceptable to you?”

“What would you be willing to offer?” she asked, taking a step forward. Her eyes gleamed, that hunger back again. “What kind of power do you have?”

“I daresay more than you can conceptualize.” Loki gave her a bored look. “You haven’t interested me yet.”

Sin cocked her head to the side. “Honestly…I might let you have him, as long as I get to watch.” Her gaze was almost coy. “I could probably learn something.” She pulled a gun out of the holster at her thigh, and began tossing it back and forth.

Loki made himself half-smile, though his eyes flicked to Steve. He seemed paler. As though he were deteriorating, perhaps. “It matters little to me.”

“You know,” Sin said, flipping the gun into her right hand and pointing it at him, “You are a pretty good liar. If I didn’t know otherwise, I might even fall for it.”

Loki’s heart stuttered in his chest. “Beg pardon?” he said, measured surprise and slight indignation. She lowered the gun and put it to Steve’s head, and smiled.

“Give me a little more credit than that,” she said. “Word’s out. Everyone knows who you belong to now.” He stiffened, almost against his own will. _She knows,_ he thought, edged with panic. Loki kept his voice perfectly cool.

“I wasn’t aware I _belonged_ to anyone,” he said, deliberately edged, a warning. Sin’s smile widened.

“So you’re not the Avengers’ lapdog?” Loki’s body went rigid, and his lips peeled back from his teeth. “So you won’t mind if I just…” he saw her finger flex on the trigger, just slightly, and his breath snagged before he could stop it, heart jumping against his rib cage, body jerking forward before he could stop it. Sin snickered. “Well,” she said, “will you look at that.”

Loki’s jaw flexed. “I intended to keep things agreeable,” he said, after a moment. “If you’d rather…”

“Pff,” Sin said. “Nice try, but you just showed you’re not willing to let me kill Captain Star-Spangled, and the minute you make a move I don’t like-” _Bang,_ she mouthed. Loki thought his heart was going to pound out of his chest. If he could be certain, if he could just be _certain_ that he could move before she could strike…

He made his body relax. Forced himself to stand down and spread his hands as though beaten. “If you knew,” he said, finally, “why play along?”

Sin shrugged. “I was curious. I’d heard about you, after the New York thing, and before that…” She looked almost thoughtful. “My father used to talk about the old myths.”

_Your father should have warned you not to meddle with me._ Loki kept his face flat, as though he were indeed, beaten. If he could just get her to move, or lower the gun, something…every nerve in his body was humming to move, to do something. Steve was so quiet, so still, and he was – afraid. “Did he, now.”

“I’m disappointed, really,” she said, the muzzle of the gun pressing into Steve’s hair, a shade darkened with sweat. “After all the time he spent looking for the ancient gods, hoping to harness their power…it’s pretty pathetic. I expected better.”

Anger was hot in his chest, but he kept it there even as it seared his lungs and heart. It would be no more than a thought to kill her. Reflex might squeeze her finger, though, and he couldn’t bring Steve back if he died. A shot to the head, that close…he suspected even Captain America wouldn’t survive. He sketched a mocking bow and smiled, though it felt unnatural. “I am so dreadfully sorry.”

“I guess nothing ever lives up to the legends, though,” she said, with a sigh. “I mean, the famous Captain America, who defeated my father, and I’m really just…not impressed.” She turned, prodding his head with the gun, and glanced over her shoulder. Loki could feel his jaw twitching, rage seething just under his skin, but he couldn’t risk it, couldn’t _risk_ it.

“If you’re so unimpressed,” Loki said, without inflection, “I would be delighted to remove him from your care.”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” Sin said. “I’m not done yet. I’m just saying…” she turned around, hand not wavering in the least. “With all the stories, I expected it to be a little harder to get him to beg. But it hardly took anything at all, really…” Sin glanced over her shoulder. She was smirking.

His vision went red. His thoughts went red. Everything slowed to perfect, bleeding-edged clarity, and he couldn’t hold back. Loki could see her hand shift just slightly as she turned, and in that sliver of a moment he severed her arm at the elbow with a knife forged solely of magic. The arm, and the hand with the gun in it, dropped to the floor before the reflex completed, bullet discharging, but not at Steve.

By the time Sin started to scream, he was already in motion.

The men nearest him died beautifully as he spun, knives sliding through their throats as through air. They shot at him but he hardly felt the sting, reaching out with magic and casting almost without thought, setting blood to boil, bodies to burst, everything he could think of. He was in a haze of blood and death and rage, body singing to unleash the fury, but his eyes fixed on Sin, scrabbling for a weapon with her remaining hand.

She saw him and jerked toward Steve as though she could still use him as a shield (perhaps, if he were awake, perhaps, if she hadn’t hurt him into unconsciousness, she might have relied on the Captain’s mercy to save her), but Loki was faster.

“I would give you a slow death,” he said, his own voice strange in his ears, vibrating in a way he couldn’t remember hearing before. “But you’ve already delayed me long enough.”

He wrapped his fingers around her throat and crushed it, heedless of the knife she stuck in his side.

Silence. Loki stood in the midst of the field of slaughter and struggled to breathe.

He could hear cries of alarm down the hallway, and glanced toward the door, still open. It slammed closed, and then he caught another sound. A quiet moan, as someone stirring slowly from unconsciousness.

He turned, everything still feeling slow and out of focus, like he was moving through thick fog that grasped at his limbs.

Steve stirred, head turning limply from side to side, his skin still a ghastly color as Loki drew near to him. He snapped the bindings with a thought – anger spiking again at the red marks where they had chafed – and laid a hand on Steve’s chest. His heartbeat felt slow and not quite right, the echoes of left-over pain flashing through the connection his magic formed. One working to numb the pain and another to lend Steve strength, urge his body toward healing. He wished, again, that he had learned more of that art. For the moment…he set to pulling the various wires away, drawing needles carefully from flesh.

Steve’s eyes blinked slowly open, though they looked out of focus, and his motions were weak and strained. Loki’s stomach knotted, and his vision blurred for a moment.  “Steve,” he said, his voice sounding rough and grating to his own ears. “Look at me.”

“Bucky?” Steve slurred, his head lolling limply. Something twanged in Loki’s chest like an out of tune harp, and he pushed it down. “S’that you…?”

“Not exactly,” Loki said. He could hear the slightly clipped note in his own voice. “Terribly sorry to disappoint.” He eyed the Captain for a moment, determined that his standing even with help was unlikely, and gathered Steve’s body into his arms. He moved away from the table, boots _plish_ ing slightly in the puddles of blood.

Steve’s fingers tangled in one of the straps of his armor, the motion uncoordinated in a way that made him ache. Loki pushed that down as well.

He wanted to grind this entire miserable building into dust, wanted to tear every one of them to quivering shreds of meat. His vision fogged over with red again and he could almost feel the fine spray of their blood, hear their screams, and no one would ever – would _ever-_

“Loki?” Steve said, voice blurry. Loki’s eyes snapped to him at once, and found his eyebrows knitted together worriedly. “S’everything…”

_So you recognize me now,_ Loki thought, but recognized the petty bitterness in it, and in the next moment he was suddenly aware of how he must look. Was suddenly aware of all the blood: on him, on his hands, on Steve. He summoned a smile. “It is fine. I am unharmed.”

“Good,” Steve said, firmly, and his eyes slid shut again. Trusting Loki’s word. Loki’s heart twisted and he reached for his magic, stepped through space to the Tower. He strode across the floor and deposited Steve carefully on the couch, ignoring the exclamations at his back.

“Is he,” Stark asked, sounding nervous.

“Fine,” Loki said shortly. “I turn him over to your capable care.” He could see Thor moving, doubtless to accost him with an embrace or some such, and Banner’s mouth was opening to speak, but he removed himself to his rooms before either of them could do anything. He stood there, immobile, for a long moment. His vision was still tinged with crimson, his heart still pounding a little too hard.

Finally he wheeled with a snarl. He tore his clothing off piece by piece, leaving a trail of it as he stalked to the bathroom and flung himself into the shower, leaving the spray cold. He breathed hard as it beat against his hunched shoulders, watching pink water swirl down the drain and emptying his mind.

_Pathetic,_ floated across his thoughts, as the background noise drained away. _Worthless._

He pounded his fist against the wall. The shock ran up his arm and it felt good, to unleash a little of the storm boiling inside him. He did it again, and again, a scream building behind his teeth.

He only noticed when the water turned off and he jerked. “Sir,” the automated voice said, disinterested as ever, “do I need to call someone? Perhaps Dr. Banner?”

Loki looked down and blinked to find the tile cracked around his clenched fist, knuckles bleeding. He pulled his hand away from the new hole in the wall, slowly. “No,” he said, and his voice sounded strange in his own ears. “No…everything is…fine.”

“Are you certain?” the voice asked. Loki closed his eyes and put his hand under the water to rinse the dust of cracked tile off his skin, gritting his teeth for the sting.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m certain.”

* * *

He heard nothing for two days.

Doubtless, he told himself, Steve was recuperating, and there were meetings to see to. Doubtless everything was fine and there was nothing to worry about. Doubtless.

He paced a straight line back and forth in front of the windows for hours. The one time he’d closed his eyes, he’d woken barely an hour later screaming from nightmares of watching Doom, or the Chitauri, or possibly both, tear into the Captain’s body while he was tethered and helpless only a few feet away. _Weakness,_ he castigated himself, but it was a bit late for that. Carving out that piece of his heart now was too much to contemplate.

When a heavy knock came on the door late in the second day, he whirled around at once, his heart leaping in his chest, but the clarifying voice followed a moment later, “It is I.” Thor. Loki closed his eyes.

_He might have news,_ Loki reminded himself, and made his feet cross the room to the door. “What,” he said, flatly.

“Steve is fine,” Thor said, without delay, and the surge of relief and gratitude that washed through Loki almost swept him off his feet, and did make his knees wobble. He sagged, for a moment, unaware until the moment he let it go how much tension he had been holding. “The healers will not let him leave, yet, but he asked that I…that you be told.”

Loki ducked his head and murmured a prayer to the Norns. He’d feared – for a moment, he’d feared. Thor reached out, and then dropped his hand, and Loki forced himself to summon the words, if grudgingly. “Thank you.”

The look on Thor’s face was so pathetically grateful it hurt. Loki glanced aside. “Is that all?”

Thor hesitated, and then held out a paper bag, awkwardly. “I brought…groceries. Steve Rogers told me that he brings you food on Thursdays. I didn’t know what you usually need, but I…guessed.” Loki stared at him, and after a moment Thor fidgeted, slightly. “I thought you might require food.”

“I do not,” Loki said, blandly, though the moment after he said it he remembered that it was Thursday, and that there had been things he’d needed. Thor’s face fell.

“Will you accept it anyway?” he asked, after a moment. Loki looked at him, and sighed through his nose.

“Very well,” he said, sticking out a hand. Thor deposited the handles in his palm, their hands brushing together just for a moment. “I suppose I can store it for later. News and foodstuffs, then. Anything else?”

“Yes,” Thor said, after a labored pause. “There is…one other thing. I wished to…I wished to make certain that you were all right as well.”

Loki snorted, though something clenched in his chest, and he turned away, retreating into his rooms. “I was not the one kidnapped and tortured, if you have forgotten.” He rearranged some books on the counter, picked one up, and set it down again, avoiding looking back at Thor.

“I know, but…” He heard Thor shift, and stop. “May I come in?”

Loki hesitated. _No,_ was the right answer. He had not permitted Thor into this room since arriving here. Changing that unspoken rule now seemed like a risk. But the idea of sitting up here alone for as long as it took, with only his own thoughts for company…that sounded worse. Loki lifted a hand and flicked his fingers. “For the moment.”

Loki heard Thor step inside, closing the door behind him, and take a step toward him. He tensed, and Thor fell still. He could just see Thor’s shadow out of the corner of his eye. “You were…very upset,” Thor said, carefully. “And when you returned…you did not stay near Steve.”

Loki shrugged tensely. “I felt certain your friends would not welcome my presence, and did not wish to hinder the Captain’s treatment.”

He could almost hear Thor frown, even without looking. “I would not expect that to stop you. You ever were – a worrier. And prone to hover when…someone who mattered to you was injured.”

“When you were injured, you mean,” Loki said, dryly. “I can’t recall anyone else.” He wasn’t sure if he meant _anyone else who mattered to me then_ or otherwise. Thor made a sound like an uncertain, awkward laugh.

“I…yes. So it struck me as odd,” he added, rushing onward. Loki made himself turn, keeping his expression dispassionate.

“Now who is worrying?” he drawled. Thor’s eyes scanned his face, brows furrowed with concern. Loki wished he hadn’t looked. “And needlessly. I am, of course, fine.”

“Steve will recover swiftly,” Thor said, slowly. “And I do not doubt you saved him from a terrible fate.”

_Not soon enough._ Loki felt his mouth thin. _He should not have been harmed at all._ “Mm,” Loki said, noncommitally. Thor made a motion as though to reach out again, though he stopped it. “I killed not a few of them,” Loki said, suddenly, not sure why. “It likely could have been avoided, but I…lost my temper.”

Something of thunder slipped into Thor’s eyes. “Do you expect me to chastise you for that?” he asked. “Good. They deserved no better.”

Loki jerked his head slightly. “No doubt he would disagree.” Thor, to his gratitude, did not ask who ‘he’ was supposed to be.

“Is that what troubles you?” Thor sounded incredulous. “Do you think Steve would hold the deaths of his enemies against you?” _He might,_ Loki thought, but that wasn’t it, not really. His rooms felt too full with Thor in them, like he couldn’t breathe quite deeply enough.

“It doesn’t matter,” Loki said, not quite bitterly. It was petty, foolish. Steve was fine. He ought to simply rejoice in that. But it was all tangled up together, and he couldn’t unknot any of it from the rest.

“It seems it matters to you,” Thor said, bull-headed as ever, and Loki could have stabbed him.

“Perhaps it does,” he snapped, “but that doesn’t mean I wish to speak to _you_ about it!” Thor looked startled, but only for a moment. Loki still felt a sudden and hateful burst of shame. He turned away again, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. He wanted Steve here, where he could see him, but he would not…

“I am sorry,” Thor said, after a long moment. “I should not pry.”

Loki coughed something like a laugh. “When have you known how to do anything else?”

“I am trying to learn.” Thor sounded rueful. They were both silent, but eventually Thor asked, “I…do you wish me to leave?”

_Yes. No._ Loki grimaced at nothing. “Already? We’ve hardly screamed at each other at all, yet.”

“I suppose my hope is that we do not,” Thor said, his voice serious in a way that made Loki’s skin itch. “I am – this is the first time we have spoken in more than a year, Loki. I am merely…I do not wish to ruin a chance that I might speak to you again, before another year is past.”

Loki closed his eyes for a moment, feeling his mouth twist. “Ambitious.”

“Is it?”

Loki sighed, his shoulders slipping down. It was…hard, sometimes. To remember to keep Thor out of his mind and heart and thoughts and life. He no longer tensed every time Steve mentioned his name without thinking, and a few times he’d come very near to thinking fondly of old memories, Thor-memories, that had been untouchable for a time. “Maybe,” he said, finally. “It is difficult to say.” Silence, again. He turned, eventually, and raised his eyebrows at Thor, who was looking at him with a strange expression. “Well?”

“I suppose I shall just have to see,” he said, slowly, and then seemed to shake himself. “You should go to Steve. He is worried as well, and I know he would be grateful for your presence.”

Loki made a dismissive gesture. “I’m sure,” he said, carelessly. “I’ll keep that suggestion in mind.”

* * *

Loki half expected the shrill screaming of an alarm when he slipped out of his rooms in the middle of the night without an escort and set off for the elevator, but there was not so much as a beep. The hair prickled on the back of his neck with the knowledge that the computer was undoubtedly watching him, but he ignored the feeling, keeping his stride even.

He took the stairs instead of the elevator, not interested in becoming trapped in the event that someone did decide he shouldn’t be out of his quarters, weaving his way down to the floor where he remembered the infirmary being located. The layout of this absurd structure had been one of the first things he’d memorized, even long before he’d begun staying here. He let himself through a pair of locked doors with a flick of his wrist, and paused.

There was only one occupied bed, though, and Loki padded silently over, after a brief pause. Steve’s eyes were closed, but Loki could see them moving rapidly under the lids, his mouth set in a small frown. He still looked pale, dark and bruise-like circles visible around his eyes, and he could see the white of bandages above the sheets, but he seemed relaxed, at least. Resting. Loki let out a quiet exhale.

He’d needed to see. To be sure.

Loki made himself turn, however reluctantly, but stopped when he heard a slight shift in Steve’s breathing, a raggedness slipping in. He turned back and found that Steve’s frown had deepened, eyebrows pulling together. Loki took a quiet step towards the bed, and something, perhaps his shadow or the sound of his feet on the floor, however quiet, reached down into Steve’s rest. He jerked, coming awake with a sharp inhale, eyes wide and immediately tense. Loki fell perfectly still. He could see disorientation, fear, and his heart dropped heavily into his stomach.

“Who’s…” Steve’s voice sounded faintly blurry.

“It’s only me,” Loki said, keeping his voice measured, and keeping a distance, as well, though he was suddenly aware of an acute desire to curl his body around Steve’s and take them both somewhere properly safe, even knowing that there was nowhere that would be. Steve still looked uncertain, nervous, and Loki raised a hand and summoned a light, just enough to illuminate his face. “I wished to…”

Steve relaxed, sinking back down to his elbows. “Oh,” he said, and closed his eyes. “You startled me.”

“I thought you were sleeping,” Loki said, carefully. Steve nodded, fractionally, though his eyes stayed closed. After a moment, Loki moved to the bedside and summoned a chair, sitting down awkwardly, releasing the light to bob at his shoulder. “Not…not well,” Loki added, eyes on Steve’s face, watching painfully closely. Steve was quiet for a moment, then shook his head. Loki frowned. “Captain?”

Steve’s eyes opened. “Steve,” he said, somewhat emphatically.

“Beg pardon?”

“Don’t…call me Steve.” There was a strange set to his mouth, and a shadow in his eyes that it took Loki a moment to understand, and then he nearly felt his teeth click together. _That’s mine,_ he wanted to hiss. _She can’t taint it,_ but of course, the woman who had called herself Sin already had. However she had used it against him…Loki glanced away. “Not forever,” Steve added, “just…”

“I understand.” Loki reached out, not letting himself think about the gesture too much, to brush a few errant strands of blond hair off Steve’s forehead, and watched Steve relax, slightly. He shifted his fingers, letting them run back through Steve’s hair.

“Bruce offered me something to help me sleep,” Steve said, after a moment. “I didn’t take it.”

Loki frowned, though he kept the rhythm of his fingers steady. “Why not?” he asked, instead of chiding. Steve wasn’t a fool. His Captain was quiet for a long while, though, until Loki almost thought he wasn’t going to answer.

“I don’t like the feeling. Of being…out of it. Not being able to respond if I need to.” Steve chuckled, though it sounded weak. “I guess that sounds kind of paranoid.”

“You’re a warrior,” Loki said. “It’s understandable.” He didn’t ask if she had kept him drugged into submission. Suspected that he didn’t need to. His left hand, not in Steve’s hair, curled into a fist, and he wished he had killed the creature more slowly.

“I’m sorry,” Steve said, suddenly, and Loki jerked.

“What are _you_ apologizing for?” he asked, voice a little sharp. Steve’s head turned away from him.

“For upsetting you. Or worrying you.” He sounded faintly embarrassed, self-conscious. “I don’t like making people worry. It’s not-”

“Why,” Loki said, unable to keep the note of tension out of his voice. “Because you must always be the strong one for everyone else, and it is impermissible for you to fail, even for a moment, to be the invulnerable idol you are expected to be?”

Steve blinked. “I didn’t-”

Loki gave him a hard look. “I may not like that you are not invincible, but if I resented your humanity I would never have touched you. It is that you are human that makes you what you are.” The words spilled from his mouth almost before he’d considered them. “The ones who need apologize are those who think they can harm you with impunity when you are under _my_ protection.”

He realized, belatedly, that he might have overplayed his hand. The look Steve was giving him was a strange one, startled and thoughtful all at once. Loki made himself settle back in the chair he’d summoned, and tried to look as though he’d said nothing of very much importance.

“I’m all right,” Steve said, after a pause. “I’m not…I heal fast.”

“Physically,” Loki said, and then wanted to pinch himself. He looked hastily away. “My apologies. I should not-”

“No,” Steve said, though he sounded a little uncertain. “You’re not…I’ve always told you that it’s not a bad thing to…hell of a hypocrite I’d be to make exceptions for myself. But I – _will_ be fine.”

_Would you tell me,_ Loki wanted to challenge him, _that you did not recall your years under the ice, as you were unable to fight? That you did not remember the horrors of your first war, the friends lost there, that being held by HYDRA touched no nightmares of yours,_ but to strip him bare like that would be a cruelty Steve had always spared him. “Will be,” Loki said, nonetheless, keeping his voice quiet. “But _are_ not.” It was easier than he expected to speak the words: “Let me help.”

His breath caught in his chest for a moment, the fear that Steve would turn him away, would refuse the offer, but Steve’s eyes on him were just confused. “Help how?” he asked, after a moment.

“I may not be able to…for the moment, just to give you a few hours of restful sleep. I will stay here, as your eyes.” He could see Steve frowning, marshalling protests, and added, “I will leave before anyone else awakes. If the computer hasn’t warned anyone by now, I think we can suppose a suspension of the rules for a little while.” Steve’s eyebrows pulled together, and Loki let his fingers slide out of Steve’s hair and down to his chin, traced the line of his jaw. “Let me watch over you,” he said, and did not speak the _please._ “You need the rest.”

“All right,” Steve said, and Loki bent down to kiss his lips lightly. He could feel the tension sliding back into him, and let the kiss linger until it eased a little, pulling his lips away only to gather Steve’s hand between his own and press each knuckle gently to his lips. He could feel the newness of fresh skin under his lips. Steve let out a quiet, shuddery sigh, and then said, even more quietly, “I trust you.”

Like a fist around his heart. Loki exhaled over Steve’s skin and murmured the words for the spell, green-gold threads twining down his arm and vanishing. Steve shivered, his eyes slightly wide as he watched, though they grew heavy quickly.

“Oh,” Steve said, his voice thick. He slumped back, head dropping onto the pillow with a thump. Loki lowered Steve’s hand from his mouth, though he kept it clasped between his. “That’s…effective.”

Loki smiled, fractionally. “Sleep well,” he said. “And without dreams. I can keep watch.”

Steve’s eyelids drooped. “You’ll be here?”

“I’ll be here,” Loki confirmed, quietly, and Steve smiled faintly, eyes closing, muscles going slowly slack.

Loki moved to replace Steve’s hand at his side, but at the last moment he simply shifted his fingers, folding them around so the tips could just touch the soft beat of his pulse in the wrist, keeping count of that steady rhythm. His.

Banner came first, early in the morning. He stepped inside, and Loki glanced up, felt himself stiffen. He didn’t let go of Steve’s hand, though, almost made it a challenge, stared at the man, warily defensive. Banner looked thoughtful, and maybe like he wanted to smile.

“How is he,” he asked, quietly, after a long moment of still silence between them.

“Healing,” Loki said, slightly curtly, but despite his resentment…he half moved as though to go, only to stop short as Steve’s fingers tightened on his wrist. Loki looked back sharply, but his breathing was still the deep, even sound of sleep. He could feel Banner looking, and wanted to tense.

“It’s all right,” he said, after a moment. “I’ll come back later. He needs the rest.” Loki eyed him, but Banner didn’t acknowledge it, added an almost cheerful, “Good morning,” before he left.

Loki watched the door close, and looked back at Steve, still sleeping soundly.

“I am a fool,” he murmured, into the quiet, resettling their linked hands. “But perhaps you are as well.”

The world wasn’t going to end yet.

He could have this, a little bit longer, in the time measured out by the beats of Steve’s heart under his fingertips.


End file.
